Pioneer and Indian Road Trip!

My cousin got married last weekend so I figured we would turn the drive into a mini road trip. We recruited my sister and her husband Jon into coming with us and had a blast.

Our first stop was Cove Fort. Cove Fort was built in 1847 by Ira Hinckley and his family (President Hinckley's grandpa I think). The Fort was used to give travelers a place to rest. It was restored and turned back over to the Church in 1988 by the Hinckley family and was dedicated in 1992 by President Hinckley.

During the tour we learned that the Hinckley family and probably all early settlers were very resourceful and didn't waste anything! For example - A worn out dress would be cut into shreds to weave into a rug. When the rug wore out it would be cut up and burned in the fire - after it was burned the ashes would be mixed with animal fat and lye to be made into soap. If we were only half as resourceful as they were I'm sure we'd save thousands of dollars a year on stuff we don't need.

This is a picture of the four of us in the interior of the fort. You can see the lava rock they used to build the fort behind us.

The tour guide told us how the door ishollow and was filled with sand to stop bullets or arrows from penetrating. She also told us that the Hinckley family was so well respected by the Native Americans that they never attacked the fort.

Next on our stop was Fremont Indian State Park. This place is cool if you are into rock carvings, pictographs or petroglyphs.

The artifacts from the Fremont Indians weren't discovered in Southern Utah until 1983 when surveyors were sent out to check the area before I 70 was going to be built. They discovered a cave of rock drawings and later a huge city.

It's kind of neat to think that stuff is all around us just waiting to be discovered - even in Utah. The Fremont Indians lived in Utah around 1500 AD or so.

We went on a short hike and saw some of the carvings.

If you look right above my head you can see some more.

This was one of the homes they found. You can actually climb down inside and look at it. The Fremont Indians lived in underground dirt homes.

There is also a museum and visitor center at the park. Jon and Nicole made friends with some of the woodland creatures.

After a long day of site seeing we went to my cousin's reception (she had the reception the night before the wedding...weird I know :)

These are our cute grandparents. I am named after my grandma Rosalie :)

We got up early Saturday morning to do initiatories before my cousin's sealing. Once we got there though we found out they don't do initiatories until later on Saturday. They let us go and do sealings with the temple workers who do them between sessions. It was really neat to be able to do sealings with my sweetheart, sister and her husband. Everytime I do sealings I think about how cool it will be when we adopt a baby to have them sealed to us. They will be able to receive all the same blessings that children who are born the their parents receive.

My cousins sealing was really neat to. The Manti temple is absolutely BEAUTIFUL inside. It's definitely one of my new favorites.

It was a fun weekend of traveling, laughing and visiting with family. I'm hoping maybe the next cousin to get married will decide to get sealed in the Hawaii temple or something so we'll have an excuse to go there :)